SJ Rozan

Hey, the pianos are back! 88 pianos all around NYC! In public places, for you to play, or listen to others play. Here’s the map so go out and, ur, play!

Loudest bird of all —

Robin warning others off.

But his song’s pretty.

Tern skimming surface,

Seeking breakfast. Gull just floats,

Lets it come to him.

White boat, blue water.

Weekend sailors up early,

Racing in the breeze.

For real!

There’s been a lot of loose talk lately about how cool SJ Rozan is. I’m going to demonstrate here my actual level of coolth. I’m going to post this photo, knowing I’m so UNcool that it cannot damage my coolness factor. This is me at the Penguin party last night, with the Blue Rider crew. And the penguin.

The Bird Bash is Penguin’s annual party for book bloggers at BEA. It’s BEA weekend, so there are publishing world parties everywhere. Ran into Reed Farrel Coleman, in fact, on his way to a different party as I was on my way to Penguin’s. At the Bird Bash, hung with Lyndsay Faye, whom I adore, and met Elizabeth Gilbert of EAT PRAY LOVE. Liked her right away: she was eating. Also spoke briefly with Sue Grafton. She’s Guest of Honor at Bouchercon this year and I’m doing the GoH interview. I warned her to look out because I was digging deep into her past, but it was an empty threat. She’s so classy that I don’t think I’ll find any creepy-crawlies no matter how many rocks I turn over.

Best part was hanging with the crew from Blue Rider, Sam Cabot’s Penguin imprint. Leave us just say that Sam feels right at home with Blue Rider. There was someone at the party dressed up as a penguin. For reals. The crew from Blue Rider and I had our photo taken with the penguin. If it surfaces I’ll post it for you.

Down by the river, the goose adventure continues. The parents and pair of goslings, who were once three, emerge every morning from wherever they’ve spent the night and walk across the sanitation driveway and along the path to the grass south of W. 12th St. — about a quarter of a mile — where they breakfast, sometimes continuing south to the next patch of grass or the next. They often plunk down on the walk right at the edge of the wall, as though they intend to leap in if something interrupts their nap. Then they do, indeed, nap, with one or the other of the adults standing guard. Today another pair was with them, with no goslings, so this grass seems to have been discovered as a prime goose dining area.

We are reported to have a clutch of American black duck ducklings, and either one or two clutches of mallards, depending on whom you believe. A male Gadwall has been swimming alone lately, possibly meaning his mate is sitting on a nest someplace close. They nest late, Gadwalls.

A robin, meanwhile, has been hanging around my bench, coming close as though I’d fed her once and she was hoping for more. Someone might have, but it wasn’t me. The Brants have finally all gone back and Urban Naturalist says we have terns, which would be early for them.

At the Rancho, because the migration is late this year, we’re getting birds who’ve usually come through already by the time we get out there. I saw an Indigo Bunting last weekend, my first. And the locals are hatching a tad late, too, which enabled this sight: five purple martins on a telephone wire, two adults and three stunned-looking chicks who must have fledged just before we rode up on our bikes. One of the adults flew away — dad, no doubt — but the mother wasn’t leaving until the chicks were ready to leave, and the chicks, believe me, weren’t doing anything but clutching that wire and wondering what just happened.

Cold, cold weekend at the Rancho. Never saw such a raw, rainy, windy summer day out there as Saturday was. No rain on Sunday, but still beyond chilly to actual cold. Today, finally, sun. In fact, hardly a cloud. Still cool, but not unpleasant. Memorial Day parade and wreath-laying — one at each war memorial, plus one tossed in the water for those lost at sea — followed by coffee and doughnuts at the firehouse.

waiting for the parade

on the parade route

listening to “taps”

mailbox is ready

decorated bikes

at the memorial

solemn moment

flag in the garden

firefighters’ coats

Bluejay sharpens beak

In storm-damaged catalpa

Near purple blossoms.

Wet red wheelbarrow,

Upended against white shed,

Waits for rain to stop.

Iris, bleeding heart,

Pink azaleas. Untended,

This garden still blooms.

Okay, for those of you not on Facebook, Sam Cabot’s mad publisher is putting the video clips on Youtube for the world to see. Each one goes up as the next one hits the Exclusive Content page. So, the second one having just been posted to the EC page, here’s the first. This is the one where I wave my hands around and talk while Carlos tries not to look like he’s wondering how he got associated with this crazy woman.

First weekend at the Rancho. Going to be rainy, gray, but what the hell. Hanging with my buddies, what could be bad? And what could be a better send-off than The Ebony Hillbillies playing in Grand Central as the shuttle comes in?